nice vid iggy, I'm curious whether Futures or FCS or other fin manufacturers use flowing water tanks as kind of wind tunnels for determining the best foils, rakes, etc. for each intended use or type of board, or if all that input come from team riders?

and do board manufacturers like FW use such lab set ups (as is done with designing performance boats, etc.) or whether they too rely on input from team riders, customers and the accumulated knowledge-base of their staff and engineers?

just wondering..

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I think it's all design/shaping knowledge which is refined through testing in the waves. Surfing is too dynamic for things to be done in a lab in my opinion. Foot pressure constantly changing, wave shape constantly changing, angle of attack constantly changing. There's no way you could replicate that in the lab for a perfect wave pool environment let alone a whole range of conditions.

When I was foiling my stabilizer I booked time in a hydro testing tank! The ultimate test will always be in the surf but that is no different for anything really. Whatever the product the ultimate test is the real setting in which it is meant to perform. I can tell you there are some very sophisticated modelling programs for testing performance of aircraft design and it is all about cost reduction. No point going to the expense to produce a prototype for real world testing, or even wind tunnel testing if the modelling shows it will be a dog - with surfboards it's a bit cheaper to produce a prototype and real world test it. Besides the cost of setting up a hydro testing tank would be expensive so only cost effective for larger operations. Real world testing is what counts the other testing environments are about saving costs but as they add a cost too they only become cost effective at a certain scale of production.

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I think with tank testing for boards and fins you can obviously see how the hull and foil interact with the flow of water, and I guess from that you could interpret how it would react in certain conditions and scenarios. But what you said is very true, in certain industries that testing and modelling is crucial from a financial point of view, but in the surfing world it's probably the opposite.